Microsoft added some big-league muscle to its Azure cloud executive team this summer that could embolden its market position. The second-largest public cloud provider hired Charlie Bell, a longtime executive at Amazon Web Services (AWS), according to multiple media outlets but his role and area of responsibilities at Azure remains unclear.

Microsoft hasn’t shared details about the hire yet, but Bell’s decision to leave AWS for Microsoft is a significant win for the company, according to analysts. Bell’s hiring paired with the pool of telco-centric talent Microsoft acquired earlier this summer via its deal with AT&T adds some critical expertise that could help Microsoft take more market share and expand its opportunities in the burgeoning telco cloud space. 

“Azure is certainly in the position that it’s No. 1 competitor remains AWS, and absorbing Bell into the fold provides a leader in the cloud services space,” said Patrick Filkins, senior research analyst at IDC.

Microsoft’s hiring of Bell is an undisputed win for the company because many, including ZK Research principal analyst Zeus Kerravala, considered Bell to be the heir apparent to Andy Jassy, the former CEO of AWS who was recently promoted to CEO of Amazon, the analyst explained.

Instead of elevating Bell to run AWS, Jassy hired Adam Selipsky, the former CEO of Tableau and a former VP at Amazon, to take his previous job. 

“Regardless of what Microsoft has done, they have remained a distant No. 2 to AWS. Infusing some AWS into Microsoft is certainly a good thing, particularly now with the security mess on their hands,” Kerravala said, referring to the Microsoft Azure Cosmos DB vulnerability.

“I would think with this kind of hire, the only measure of success would be taking share from AWS,” he added. 

Filkins said he doesn’t expect the executive boost to result in any major shake-ups in the near term, but “adding a seasoned leader who has a proven ability to not only help lead strategy development, but execute on it, can only help.”

Additional benefits could be achieved by Microsoft in the telco cloud space as it recently added some critical engineering talent to its team, including Ryan van Wyk, the former VP of network cloud at AT&T that now serves as partner software engineering manager on Microsoft’s Azure for Operators team. 

“Azure has clearly made the telco space a top priority, including not only in the infrastructure-as-a-service (IaaS) domain, or related to capturing telco IT and network workloads, but also the ability to deliver telco-centric software-as-a-service (SaaS) to telco and enterprise customers,” Filkins explained. 

“Azure’s telco strategy is broader than AWS or Google at this stage, with more touch points across the value chain. Bell could potentially help refine the current strategy, which could include sharpening the focus on communications service providers (CSP) as both customers and channel partners, or extending the strategy further into the enterprise as well,” he added. 

Filkins noted that Microsoft is also increasingly focused on enabling faster transformation in the 5G era. “While it remains to be seen, the AT&T intellectual property purchase could potentially be leveraged to make Azure’s cloud infrastructure more enticing for CSPs to run their network workloads on,” he said. 

Some of the technology Microsoft recently acquired from AT&T related to the automatic provisioning of cloud-native infrastructure that supports cloud-native network functions across network core and edge locations, Filkins explained. 

“With 5G accelerating the push to cloud native, Azure can create a clearer, more expedited path for CSPs to transform, as opposed to doing it internally, or using internal public clouds, which is what many have been doing with NFV over the past few years to mixed results,” he said.

Microsoft’s position in the telco and cloud markets will ultimately come down to its execution and that of its biggest rival AWS, according to Kerravala. “The telco opportunity is the most interesting right now as the competitive landscape is wide open,” he said. 

“In reality, Microsoft needs to execute flawlessly in enterprise and AWS needs to misstep for Azure to gain share in enterprise, but not so in telco as we are in the early innings,” Kerravala added. 

Microsoft gained a “deep telco bench to go after the 5G opportunity using AT&T as a case study,” he said.